


Hidden Truth

by Phoenix5680



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Ending, James Potter & Lily Evans Potter Live
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-15
Updated: 2019-04-15
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:27:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24234277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Phoenix5680/pseuds/Phoenix5680
Summary: The real truth of what happened to James and Lily Potter, that Halloween night.The idea of this story is to try to follow as much of canon as possible (except Cursed Child), however of course that isn't always possible.
Relationships: James Potter/Lily Evans Potter
Kudos: 2





	1. The Beginning

**Author's Note:**

> Remember that this story is very much incomplete. You may have lots of questions, and feel free to ask them, but they may be answered later on in the story.  
> Thanks.

One day had passed. As the leftovers of Halloween emptied the households of Britain, somewhere, in a cold room Lily awoke. She hadn’t been able to sleep much and cold sweat covered her. She wasn’t sure what had happened but she knew she wasn’t where she had been the previous night. And most importantly, she didn’t have Harry. She stifled a sob so as not to wake James and looked out of their damp and dark cell, to see a vast space of black. Black nothingness. They were truly alone. All they had was the knowledge that they were out of the way and He had Harry. Yet they hadn’t seen Him. The room they were in was cold and musty, but apparently reasonably furnished. A single satisfactory bed perched in the corner, with a thin duvet and worn pillow. A chest of drawers with a variety of clothes in. An empty table that had an empty plate, presumably for food. A small doorway led into a bathroom but nothing more. A shelf in the main cell held a few solitary books and a Wizarding chess set. That was all. 

A week had passed. James and Lily sat huddled together in the cold, not saying a word. The news had come to them, a newspaper draped on the end of their bed with a beak mark from the owl they hadn’t seen, that they were pronounced dead and that Sirius had been sentenced to Azkaban as a follower of Voldemort. They were helpless. They both knew that there was nothing to do so they just sat, biding their time. No news on Harry. The weather outside had become miserable. Despite this, they hadn’t heard or seen He Who Must Not be Named, which led them to believe the outside rumours. That their son, Harry, had finished him off for now at least. But had Harry been harmed in doing this? The lack of knowledge worried the two.

A month had passed and this time it was James awake, while Lily slept. They had both been frantically worried about Harry and Sirius, but news led them to hope that Harry was alive and well. They were kept well fed by a charm that provided an unlimited amount of food which was sourced from an unknown location. They had both tried to find a way out, but it seemed the cell was locked and they were enclosed with magic. James paced the small cell, neither had wands and neither had any idea to what extent Voldemort had gone to to fake their death, or to what reason. The sky outside, seen through the bars of the window was too consistently dark to make anything of their surrounding but they kept each other company and could understand the outside world by the Daily Prophet, delivered one day late constantly but to their relief. How long would this last?

Two months had passed. Christmas had come and gone, and James and Lily could only hum the lyrics to carols in the distance of their memories. The entirety of Christmas Day was a painful presence as they worried about Harry and pleaded that he enjoy himself. Still unknowing of his whereabouts, the best James could do was run his fingers down Lily’s hair. “I love you”. He said the same every morning and every evening, and Lily’s reply was always the same, nestling in for a cuddle. “I love you too.“ The bitter cold had swallowed their bare cell and at night they would lie close to keep out as much of the biting breeze as possible. But everyday dragged on. 

It had been six months. Six months since they were thrown into the nothingness of life. Six months since they had been suspected dead. Six months since they had lost their son, maybe never to be seen again. Lily stood by the window, looking out in the sun that now shone brightly into the room and lit up their thoughts a bit. But the change in weather brought no new news, and they were left with the same maddening thoughts as they had been before. Lily wiped a tear from her face and stumbled back towards the bed, where James sat reading the paper. The same paper he had read for hours that day already, hoping something may appear. Something he hadn’t seen before that may tell him something about Harry or Sirius or the war, but nothing. 

“James, let’s play chess. “ Lily urged, trying to distract him from unpleasant thoughts. 

“I’m just searching...” Lily cut him off. 

“Don’t. You have read it enough to know it off by heart. One day James. I promise, just not today. Let’s play. ”

And so began their thousandth game of chess since Halloween.

A year had passed, and there was still no news. The Wizarding world had gone on as usual, the only information of interest being various Death Eater members being trialled. Some found guilty, some found innocent. It was all the same to James and Lily now, who dreaded to think of how Sirius was doing without the luxuries James and Lily had in their desolate cells. The weather had again depressed itself and a steady downpour of rain scattered the outside world. And somewhere, a young Harry watched Dudley poking at a pumpkin, wondering where he had been before this. James and Lily would each have a time they would curl up together and cry, but determination to see Harry and to prove Sirius innocent kept them going. James dearly missed his marauder friends, but he, unlike the others; knew the truth about Pettigrew betraying him. Lily often had to calm him down over the subject, for fear of him doing something he would regret. Meanwhile, she very much missed her beloved sister and her friends and family. Dreams of shaggy black dogs and a happy werewolf kept James awake at night. Both wondered where everyone was right now but nothing could be found.


	2. The Longest Experience of Nothing

Five years had gone, and James and Lily had gotten used to this life of struggling and crying over lost things. Neither of them gave up though and they waited everyday for the spell that kept them caged to break. Harry had begun his first school and made a point of avoiding his cousin, unaware of his parents mourning his absence every minute. He thought them dead, a terrible car crash. But he knew better than to pursue the topic further with his Aunt and Uncle who seemed unfazed by the tragedy. Harry wore baggy clothes and avoided his cousin, spending hours at a time watching the spiders in his bedroom, or playing with his toy knights that Dudley gave to him after their arms and heads fell off. Meanwhile, James and Lily paced the cell again, talking and making theories about how everything was in the outside world. After a while they sat down again and played more Wizards Chess.

Seven years had passed, and Harry had gotten his first pair of glasses, a free pair from the Opticians that had been broken within an hour by Dudley 'accidentally' punching Harry in the face. Harry didn't complain, as he should have expected it and Aunt Petunia said "Eight year olds don't cry." That apparently didn't stop Dudley though, who complained when his pumpkin didn't look right. Harry disliked school intensely, long hours of work and avoiding Dudley's lot. Among the strange happenings, Harry didn't need something odd to happen to be disliked by his Aunt and Uncle. He thought he had made friends at one point with a new boy, but that boy suddenly disappeared as soon as he had come around. Harry couldn't help but feel it had something to do with Dudley's gang, mostly by the smirk on his cousin's face when he saw Harry standing alone. Back in the cell, James and Lily were playing chess again. They had gotten bored by far and had begun writing stories for each other, inventing games and spells. James had made a whole variety of joke spells he couldn't wait to test, and teach Harry.

"I do miss him." James suddenly stated, when Lily had taken his bishop. She looked up into his eyes.

"So do I. Oh, so do I. He'll be eight now." The two sat in silence for a minute before Lily looked down at the board. "Checkmate." The thought of what Harry was like now, without his parents to guide them was a scary thought.

Almost 10 years had passed. It was September the 1st and as Lily and James sat huddled on the bed, in London, Harry was trying to find Platform 9 3/4.

"He will be starting Hogwarts today," Lily stated while breaking out into a smile.

"How are you sure he'll get in?"

"James! Don't you remember when he smashed the china mug, from the other side of the room? Or when you made him laugh so much he accidentally set your hair on fire?" James laughed and Lily stroked his hair affectionately. 

"Or the time he didn't want to finish his peas, and it suddenly vanished?" he added. The two then began discussing Hogwarts.

"I do hope he'll make friends," blurted Lily at one point, an edge of worry in her tone. James just laughed and held up the newspaper from ten years ago, that he had tucked under their bed. They had a reasonably large pile of newspapers, so large that Lily had begun stuffing newspapers out of the window which fell for a while to an unknown surface.

"The Boy Who Lived, I bet he will!" They continued talking for hours, with only a break to eat lunch. Their only reference of time was the sun and moon, and when the sun had well and truly set James looked up from his book suddenly.

"I hope he's in Gryffindor. I suppose Ravenclaw wouldn't be too bad. Hufflepuff... meh. But Slytherin,"

Lily cut in sharply.

"You should be happy whatever house he ends up in, as it means he is alive." James was taken aback, this was the first time Lily had spoken sharply to him for ages.

"Of course Lil, I was only joking. But you know I want him to be a Gryffindor."

"Of course. I'm sorry, I am just fed up of knowing he's out there but he doesn't know we are."

And by the time the moon was hovering above them like an orb of hope, they were both asleep, curled up on their bed together while Harry slept peacefully in his four-poster bed. Looking forward to his new life with his friends and also worrying about learning magic.


	3. The Newspaper Shares Hope

Almost twelve long years had gone by, and in the little cell in an unknown location, James and Lily stirred. As usual, they had been woken by a flutter of wings at their barred window. This flutter of wings was connected to a large, beautiful white, snowy owl who dropped a paper and then departed. This was the same owl that had visited them for a couple of years now, but different from before. James dragged himself from the bed and stumbled over to collect the paper from the floor, where he gasped. Lily immediately jumped up and rushed over to him. There, on the front page of the paper was the large face of Sirius Black.

"Padfoot has escaped!" James cried with glee, staring into the picture of his best friend with excitement. Lily smiled too, but frowned as she read on.

"But at such a price, James. He won't last long- you know what those dementors are said to be like." James looked at her anxiously for a moment and nodded.

"How did he even get out?" she continued, walking over to the odd plate of magic food to prepare breakfast. James went and sat on the bed, reading the rest of the paper.

"At least, I hope he can meet Harry. Maybe he can explain that he's innocent." James said to Lily's back. She turned around momentarily and smiled.

"I wonder if Harry even knows that he exists. He could do with knowing some family," she agreed.

As James went on through the paper he suddenly stopped and laughed.

"They have stationed Dementors around Hogwarts. What do they think Sirius is going to do? Try to kill Harry!? He's his godfather for goodness sake!"

Out at Hogwarts, Harry began his first full day back in his third year of Hogwarts with Ron and Hermione. Each of them worried for the safety of the mass-murderer Sirius Black. And Harry most of all felt threatened, having been given the news that the escaped prisoner was after him.

Thirteen years and two days had passed, and James and Lily were relieved to find that no news had been shared of the death of Harry. There was however, news at the end of July, that Sirius Black had been captured, but from the way the story was written; James and Lily knew it was fake. Anyway, there was now more important things as James and Lily had just received the newspaper talking about the Triwizard tournament and its presence at Hogwarts this year. The best thing about it however was the picture and information that greeted them as they opened the relevant page.

"It's Harry!" Lily cried out suddenly, pointing at the picture of the champions. Upon reading they found out that Harry had been selected as a champion; "Bravo!" "How dangerous!" along with three others. James quickly tore that page out and balanced it on the table. It was, after all, the only picture they had of Harry. The first time they had seen his face since putting him to bed that Halloween night thirteen years ago. After a short argument weighing up the dangers of the tournament and why he should or shouldn't do it, James said; "If he wasn't in it we would never get any news or pictures of him." Lily had to agree with this, though she won the argument with; “I’d rather him be alive than know he is dead.” Despite this, they both knew that they couldn’t change whether or not Harry was selected as a champion so all they could do was hope profusely that Harry would be safe, and enjoy it.

(unfinished)


End file.
